I don't want to wait until late 2013 or 2014 before we can get dedicated (NORD-funded) POIS research under way. At the moment, that is the best we are heading for.
We've got 2 months to get to our NORD target this year and save ourselves from waiting this long.
We've had some very generous donations recently but some of these are to be made over a period of months. I'm certainly no less grateful to the donors for this fact but it does mean the current NORD pledge tally can be misleading as it uses the total that will be donated by 2013, not by March this year. We are still currently not in a good position to make the March deadline this year. To me it looks like we're half way at best.
After we reach our $33500 target, it'll likely be some months before a researcher is appointed to work on POIS through NORD. It may be some time after this that work finally begins. I believe I'm right in saying that we really need to make the March 2012 deadline (2 months time) if we're going to see any benefits from NORD funded research within the next two years. There isn't a quick fix. But it'll be quicker if we begin now. Also, things will cost more in years to come. $33500 might not be the minimum required in future years, it might be more.
We have some things that help some of us (eg. Niacin, immunotherapy) at the moment. But these are not cures so far or 100% effective treatments. And we still don't know what causes POIS. We have much better theories than we used to and even evidence for some of them but all POIS sufferers are not the same and what works for some doesn't work for others. We need to push this if we're going to help everyone. We need to know what POIS is, what causes it, what varieties of POIS there are and use this to get as close as possible to being cured/ being POIS-free. For us and for future sufferers.
2 months is all we have. So far I have pledged $500. On the condition that we make the March 2012 deadline, I'm upping my pledge to $1500 (seriously, no clappy applause gifs for this please, lets just get that total)